The kind of person whose money lay in black bags at his feet.
When the nurse said she was asking for him, Tobenna stood.
Zara was sitting up on the clinic bed, the sharpness fully returned to her eyes despite the bandage at her side.
“Sit down,” she said.
He sat.
“I want to ask you something,” she said. “And I want an honest answer.”
“All right.”
“If you had not heard me,” she said, “if you had walked past without knowing I was there, what would you have done with the bags?”
Tobenna did not rush.
Outside, he could hear a goat bleating near the clinic fence.
He looked down at his hands.
Then back at her.
“I don’t know.”
Zara’s expression did not change.
He continued.
“I would like to say I would have found someone to report them to. I would like to say I would have done the right thing regardless. But I don’t know. Hunger makes a man imagine things. I only know what I did once I heard you.”
For a long moment, she said nothing.
Then she leaned back slightly.
“That is the most honest answer anyone has given me in a long time.”
Tobenna said nothing.
“Most people would perform virtue for me,” she continued. “They would tell me they would have carried the bags to the police untouched, even with no food, no shelter, and no witness. They would lie because they think perfect answers build trust.”
Her eyes stayed on him.
“They don’t. Honest uncertainty builds more trust than performed goodness.”
He looked away.
“You saved my life,” she said.
“I did what was there to do.”
“You carried my money seven kilometers.”
“I carried your money because I was carrying you.”
part 2
